Preparation

Too weak am I to pray, as some have prayed,
That love might hurry straightway out of mind,
And leave an ever-vacant waste behind.

I thank thee rather, that through every grade
Of less and less affection we decline,
As month by month thy strong importunate fate
Thrusts back my claims, and draws thee toward the great,
And shares amongst a hundred what was mine.

Proud heroes ask to perish in high noon:
I'd have refractions of the fallen day,
And heavings when the gale hath flown away,
And this slow disenchantment: since too soon,
Too surely, comes the death of my poor heart,
Be it inured to pain, in mercy, ere we part.